Youth Pistol Competitor Emily Robinson Steps Into The Next Arena

STORY BY EMILY ROBINSON * PHOTOGRAPHS BY RODNEY ROBINSON

I have always been a pistol shooter. Even the first time I was out on the range, I loved everything about shooting, from the smell of the gunpowder to the sound the steel makes when it is hit by a bullet. I think that’s what got me hooked on competitive shooting. I was 9 years old when I attended and watched my first Glock Sport Shooting Foundation (GSSF) match in Columbia, S.C., and my whole family attended to see what it was all about.

The second match I attended was the GSSF annual shoot in Conyers, Ga., and although I did not shoot in that match, I was allowed to borrow a Glock with a .22 conversion and shoot the plate rack. Right after this event, my parents bought my brother and me a Glock 17 and I actually competed in my first match two months later. I loved how everyone was so friendly, supportive and helpful. Since I was so small, people gave me advice on how to hold the gun, my stance and other tips. Some of the people who helped me that day have become longtime friends and are now like a second family. After several years of shooting GSSF matches all over the Southeast, it was a natural progression to move to United States Practical Shooting Association (USPSA).

During her first 3-Gun challenge, the pistol portion was second nature to Robinson. It was the rifle and shotgun segments where she felt she had a learning curve to conquer.

MY FIRST USPSA MATCH was the North Carolina Sectional in 2012. I had never even been to a USPSA match, nor had I ever practiced for anything like it. It was all new, and I was even a little intimidated. It was so much fun watching everyone on my squad shoot during their round, but when it was my time to shoot, I felt like a deer in the headlights. After I completed the first stage, I was a little surprised at how well I had done. I was really slow, but the accuracy was there and that was most important to me at that time. Just as I had been taught in GSSF, accuracy was first on the priority and speed would eventually come, and that’s exactly what happened. To date, I have won three state-level titles in USPSA.

If you ever have an opportunity to meet this tall young lady with the most charming country accent you have ever heard as we have, don’t be fooled by it! She is a powerful competitor and is taking the competition circuit by storm – all of them.

After three and a half years of USPSA and even longer in GSSF, I got the itch to try 3-Gun. I had met so many people who shot 3-Gun that I really wanted to give it a try. Since I had not worked with shotguns or rifles very much, there was definitely a learning curve. When it was time to get started, I had to gather equipment and get it ready. For Christmas I received a Mossberg JM930, which can be used for 3-Gun right out of the box, so that was a great surprise. Then I had the amazing experience of attending the SHOT Show for the first time in 2016. I set up appointments with several potential sponsors, one of which was NightForce, which turned out to be huge for me. Coincidentally, my interviewer had been a range officer and fellow production shooter at the Georgia State USPSA Championship, so he had heard of me. He gave me a chance and supplied me with an awesome NightForce NXS 1-4×24 optic and mount even though I hadn’t yet shot a 3-Gun match.

Similar to my first USPSA match, I had never attended a 3-Gun match. The closest I had come to seeing one was on TV, and I was really excited but nervous. I had enough time to shoot about 100 rounds through my shotgun and get my rifle zeroed from the 100-yard line with my new NightForce optic. I was dead-on within 10 rounds. Awesome optic! I also shot a few rounds on the move to try to get comfortable. My Glock 34 would round out my 3-Gun trio. Items such as shotgun-shell carriers and rifle-magazine pouches were borrowed from friends, but I felt just about ready.

During initial course walk-through at her first 3-Gun event, Robinson’s nervousness began to subside as she realized the many similarities with USPSA, with which she was much more familiar.

THE DAY HAD ARRIVED and it was time for my first 3-Gun match. I arrived at the range and everything was new. I’d never been to this facility, didn’t know very many people there and the stages looked longer and more complicated than pistol stages. My nervousness subsided as I watched a few people walk the stages. I realized that the stage prep is pretty much the same as in pistol matches. You have to understand the layout of the stage and the stage brief, then develop a plan that works for you. I talked to a few people about their stage plans, and once I broke the stages down between the three weapons, everything seemed to fall into place. I wasn’t worried about the pistol stages, and I knew I would just have to slow down a little on the rifle and shotgun.

I knew the rifle and shotgun were going to be obstacles due to my lack of trigger time. The match started off a little rocky. My shotgun magazine spring created a problem that stopped my rounds from feeding into the chamber. One of the match directors had an extra spring that I borrowed and fixed the problem – another example of how great people are in the shooting sports! By the second stage I started to feel more comfortable, and overall felt that I did pretty well.

During her third 3-Gun round, which included four long-range rifle targets set at 55, 110, 160 and 210 yards, Robinson hit each target on the first try, except for the 210-yarder. After her first miss, she remembered to compensate for the distance and nailed it on the second try.

The last stage was probably my best. It started with three pepper poppers that threw clays into the air. These are reactive steel targets that fall to the ground when you shoot them, and as soon as they hit the ground they throw a clay pigeon into the air as a secondary moving target. I’d never shot clays like that before, but I hit them all. I even had to do a pick-up shot on one of them and still got it in the air! The next string was a pistol stage, which I shot on the move to make up some time. After that, there were four long-range rifle targets at 55, 110, 160 and 210 yards. It was time to really test that rifle zero. I set up for the shots, took a long breath and exhaled and fired the first shot. Hit! The next two shots were both hits. My confidence was pretty high. I fired at the 210-yard target and missed. I remembered to adjust for distance using my optic and fired again. Hit! I was so proud of myself. I was pretty happy with how I did on that stage especially. There were several things I had never encountered but I worked through them. In the end, I had no misses and no penalties. My time wasn’t the greatest because I wanted to make sure I was safe and my hits were all good, but I was pretty happy with my results.

After her first 3-Gun competition, Robinson came away feeling great about the experience and knew where she had made mistakes. She says that in the future, she will pay more attention to how other shooters set up for their rounds.

IF I COULD HAVE CHANGED anything about my first match, I would have paid more attention to other competitor’s stage plans and applied what I observed to my own. It was a lot different than I had expected, but overall I expected to make mistakes since this was my first 3-Gun. I got a little aggravated with myself over simple mistakes, but I will learn from them!

One of the similarities between 3-Gun, USPSA and GSSF are the people. These are some of the friendliest, supportive and helpful people you will find anywhere. The people on my squad offered help throughout the entire day, and I really appreciated that.

MY ADVICE for anyone looking into 3-Gun or any shooting sport is to be confident when you go out there. If you need help or equipment, just ask. Ninety-nine percent of the time someone will be there to help, whether you know them or not. Even if it’s your first match, match directors and range officers will walk you through it to get you started. One thing I’ve learned about the shooting world is that someone will always be there to lend a helping hand.

Everyone is new at some point and no one started out as a pro. All you have to do is apply hard work and dedication, and have fun. You can learn something from everyone on the range, whether it’s your first match or you’ve been doing it for 20 years. It’s all in the way you look at things. ASJ

Emily Robinson is an avid youth shooter who first started competing in Glock Sport Shooting Foundation matches, worked her way to United States Practical Shooting Association matches and is now tackling 3-Gun competitions.

Gabrielle Pitre: Champion Rifle Markswoman

Story by Frank Jardim • Photographs provided by Gabrielle Pitre

By first appearances, Gabrielle Pitre is a typical American teenage girl, but behind her bubbly good-humored demeanor there is intense personal discipline and mental focus that has allowed her to master not one, but three shooting disciplines.

At 18 years old she is one of the youngest high-power rifle competitors to hold a master’s classification in long-range rifle shooting. The long-range Palma course of fire is shot with iron sights from the prone position at 800, 900 and 1,000 yards. That, by itself, is a significant accomplishment, but Pitre is also a high master (the highest level of achievement) in midrange rifle competition. Without getting into the details of how it’s calculated, a midrange high master scores 98.5 out of a 100 possible points on average. Midrange is shot in the same manner as long-range, but at 300, 500 and 600 yards. What makes this more amazing is that four years ago Pitre had never even picked up a match rifle.

At 18 years old, Gabrielle Pitre is one of the youngest high-power rifle competitors to ever hold a master’s classification in long-range shooting.

There are many local clubs and match events, but the Camp Perry National and the Palma regional matches reign the highest in the US. The rifles, in this ultimate sport, must use high-power and center-fire calibers, and since Camp Perry was established in Ohio in 1907 for military marksmanship training, many of the events at the national matches require shooters to use a military-service rifle. These rifles are typically modified for improved accuracy.

Looking back over the last 108 years that the national matches have been held there, bolt-action 1903 Springfields, M1 Garands and semiautomatic M14 rifles rose and fell from dominance. For the past 15 years, variations of the M16 rifle have held competitive supremacy.

In addition to a rifle capable of sub-minute-of-angle performance, success at the highest levels of competition requires keen eyesight, minute muscle control and the ability to judge and compensate for the effects wind and mirage will have on bullet impact. The average deer hunter seldom thinks about bullet drop or wind because it simply doesn’t matter that much at ranges less than 100 yards. When a competitive marksman fires a bullet at a 44-inch black circle with a 10-inch center X a half a mile away, it takes that bullet nearly 1.5 seconds to get there. A lot can happen in that time and the competitor tries to predict its path.

Gabrielle Pitre became the top junior shooter in Kentucky by winning multiple championships.

Pitre told me that learning to get the dope (adjust your aim for range conditions) is the hardest part of long-range marksmanship. Flags on the range are used to estimate wind speed and direction and shooters use high-quality spotting scopes to study the mirage. She explained her techniques to illustrate the process.

“I try to find one or two flags about halfway to the target that are easy to watch. I want to be able to see every move the flag makes up and down. I also watch for any changes in the flag’s angle from the pole; all of this tells me if the wind has changed direction. The flags that are closest to the firing line do not matter that much because the bullet has just left the barrel at full velocity and can buck the wind pretty well. The flags near the target do not matter because by that time it’s too late to do anything. By picking a flag around the middle I can split the difference.”

“A mirage is the visual distortion of the target caused by heat coming off the ground. It varies with temperature, humidity and ground cover. I use my spotting scope to evaluate it by looking at a flat surface like the top of a target berm. The mirage makes the target blurry, and in the worst cases, it can completely wash it out. If that happens, I rely on my natural point of aim to get my bullet on target. When I set myself up to shoot, it’s critical that my body is properly oriented toward the target so that my rifle is naturally aimed directly at the bull’s-eye when I lock into a firing position. It doesn’t matter if I’m shooting at the 50- or 1,000-yard mark, I always do this.”

There are so many variables to account for that long-range shooting seems like a scientific discipline. To a degree it is. However, as Pitre pointed out, the proof is in the shot. “Flags and the mirage can lie,” she says. “You figure it out after you take your shot. Then you adjust. Conditions can and do change in the time it takes you to move your eye from the flag to the sights. At times the sudden wind changes can be enough to blow you off the paper.”

The remarkable thingabout Pitre is that she participates in these sports not to be the best, but instead to simply do her best. A person who finds delight in doing their best is never troubled by the ugly side of competition. They are too busy having fun to begrudge another competitor’s better scores. Pitre also enjoys coaching new competitive shooters to develop good habits and improve their skills.

Born in Michigan, but moved to Alaska as an infant where she lived until she was thirteen, Pitre cannot recall a time when she wasn’t shooting. Some of her earliest memories are of riding over the empty tundra with her father on a four-wheeler. He let her shoot his pistol once they were safely away from inhabited areas. Though her father was a Marine Corps rifle instructor and competitive shooter, her older sister Natasha was actually the motivating force who drew Pitre into the shooting sports. As a kid, she wanted to do everything her big sister did. When Tasha took up competitive shotgun shooting, Pitre wanted to do it too. When she first tried out, she was only seven years old and could hardly hold the shotgun up. She missed every bird and the coach suggested she come back in a few years. Instead she went home and started working out to build up arm strength with 3-pound weights. Three weeks later she tried again and broke all but one. By eight years old she was competing. Pitre and Tasha soon became a sibling shooting sensation in Alaska. This culminated for Pitre when she was selected for the Alaska all-state team to shoot sporting clays in the women’s division. It was extraordinary for a 13-year-old to be chosen for a slot normally filled by the best adult women shooters in the state. Pitre had found her passion on the sporting clay field.

Had the family stayed in Alaska, Pitre and Tasha would still be shooting clay birds. However, work drew their family to Washington state, and an area with virtually no opportunity for them to continue shooting in shotgun competitions. Tasha gave up the shotgun sports and took up small-bore rifles, but Pitre refused to lose hope, and she was rewarded with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It turned out that while in Alaska, her growing skill with a shotgun had not gone unnoticed. Shortly after the move she received an invitation to shoot in a competition for future Olympic competitors. Her first instinct was to pursue the sport she loved, but the timing was wrong. Her family had just moved and the price of success would mean a huge disruption in their lives, including another move for her to the Olympic training camp. After a family discussion, Pitre concluded she was not willing to put herself or her family through those trials.

Instead, in 2011 she joined her sister at an NRAsmall-bore rifle qualification program. This is shot with .22 rifles from four positions (prone, sitting, kneeling and standing) at 50 feet. Within a year, both had reached the highest qualification, distinguished expert. Thanks to exceptional coaching and mentorship, Pitre was introduced to match rifle and long-range competition. Both sisters decided to take up the more sophisticated challenges of service-rifle competition, and so the family started an annual ritual of packing up to spend a month-long summer vacation at Camp Perry so the girls could compete in the national matches.

When the family movedto Kentucky, Pitre refined her long-range shooting skills and garnered sponsored support fromPelican cases, Nightforce optics, Lapua bullets and brass,Vihtavuori powders and ESS eyewear. She also started her own blog called From-the-line.com, where she freely shares her competition experiences. Her accomplishments are too numerous to list, but by the end of 2014 she was the Kentucky state long-range champion, long-range junior champion, midrange junior champion and took 1st place overall, making her the top junior shooter in the state. Thus far in 2015, in addition to several first place finishes in local matches, she attended the East Coast Palma Championships and took first in the master class and high junior overall.

When she graduates high school this year, Pitre plans on joining the Air Force to work in dog training and handling. She has a love of K9s that rivals her love of shooting sports and serving her country would simply continue a multi-generational family history of patriotic military service.

I think the USAF would do well to put her on their rifle team too. ASJ